Ice Cream Cups

Name: Cone Sleeves
Address: Da 408, San Jose, CA, 95128, US
Telephone: (503) 358-0443
Price range: $

Not every customer wants a cone. Ice cream paper cups give them a neat, drip-free way to enjoy a scoop, and they carry your logo right to the table.

Where they are used:

Ice cream parlors and gelato shops
Frozen yogurt bars and dessert cafes
Events, catering and school functions

Serving cones too? See our printed ice cream cone sleeves for a matching look.

Design your order Call (503) 358-0443

Ice Cream Paper Cups With Lids

Product:

Message

Attach Art Work/Image/File

100unit minimum order
4–6business days after proof approval
Freedesign help and samples
Freeshipping to the USA, Canada, UK and Australia

Picking between the two ice cream cups

For scoops eaten right away

The open cup is the workhorse of a dipping counter. Customers walk it to a bench or table, so it needs a firm rim and room for a spoon. Pair it with printed napkins and cone sleeves in the same pattern.

View product

For pints and delivery orders

Ice Cream Paper Cups With Lids

The lidded cup carries hand-packed pints home and rides in delivery bags without leaking. Shops stock it near the register as a retail item, with the flavor marked on the lid so it is easy to find in a freezer.

View product

Frozen dessert businesses that print their own cups

Scoop counters are only part of the picture; plenty of seasonal and pop-up sellers order short runs of branded ice cream cups too.

Rolled ice cream stands

Rolled ice cream is served upright in a cup with toppings piled on top. Stands choose a wide open cup, print their logo low on the wall and keep it bright enough to look good in the videos customers record at the counter.

Farm creameries

Dairies that make ice cream on site sell scoops in summer and pints all year. They print the farm name and a simple illustration of the barn or herd, and use lidded cups for the farm shop freezer.

Restaurant dessert menus

Restaurants that churn their own sorbet or gelato offer it to go. A small lidded cup with the restaurant logo turns a dessert into a take-home sale, and the same cup holds leftover dessert from the table.

Summer festival pop-ups

Pop-ups at food festivals serve hundreds of scoops in an afternoon. They order open cups only, one size, printed with the festival date, and read tips for storing and organizing ice cream before packing the freezer truck.

Build your order

Design Your Custom Ice Cream Cups

Not sure which one to pick? Start with a product from this collection, set your size, material and print, add your logo, and get a free quote with a digital proof.

Pick your size, material, printing, finish and quantity, add your logo, and send it for a free quote. If this form doesn't load, request your free quote here.

Open scoop cup or lidded cup: which one you need

This range comes down to one practical question: does the ice cream get eaten at your counter, or does it leave the building? An open scoop cup is built for the next ten minutes. The customer takes it to a bench or a table, eats it with a spoon and throws the cup away. A cup with a lid is built for the car ride, the walk home or the freezer, so it has to seal, stack and survive a drop of a few degrees in temperature without the print smudging.

Most scoop shops need both. Open cups handle single and double scoops served on the spot. Ice cream paper cups with lids handle hand-packed pints, takeout orders and anything going into a delivery bag. If you only sell at events or from a cart, open cups may be all you need. If you sell pints to take home, lids are not optional, because a loose cup in a grocery bag is a mess on the car seat.

Sizing cups to your scoop

Match the cup to the scoop you actually serve. A small cup with a generous scoop looks abundant. The same scoop in a large cup looks stingy, even though the portion is identical. Many shops run a kids size, a single, a double and a take-home pint. In US terms a pint is 16 oz and a quart is 32 oz, which is why those are the two sizes customers recognize for hand-packed ice cream. Sizes can be made to order, so you can match a scoop you have already priced.

Ice cream cup options compared

Option	Best for	Usual sizes	Things to plan
Open scoop cup	Scoop shops, gelato counters, fairs	Kids, single and double scoop sizes	Rim strength for a heaped scoop, spoon fit
Cup with lid	Takeout, delivery, hand-packed pints	Pint and quart, plus smaller takeaway sizes	Lid fit, freezer storage, labeling flavors
Small tasting or sample cup	Flavor tastings, sundae toppings, events	Very small portion sizes	Short print area, high quantities
Wide, shallow bowl-style cup	Sundaes, frozen yogurt with toppings	Medium to large	Room for toppings above the rim

For topping bars and tasting flights, small portion cups often sit alongside the main range. Our printed paper portion cups are a good fit for sprinkles, sauces and sample spoons of a new flavor.

What cold does to the cup and the print

Ice cream is hard on paper in a quiet way. The cup comes out of a dipping cabinet or freezer, meets warm air and starts to sweat. Melting ice cream runs down the inside wall. A hand-packed pint sits in a home freezer for weeks. So the board has to have a moisture barrier on the inside and stay stiff when it is cold and damp, and the outside print needs a coating that won't scuff when cups rub against each other in a freezer.

Paperboard is the standard stock, with FDA-compliant food-contact linings on the inside. A gloss finish shrugs off condensation a little better and makes bright flavor colors look rich. Matte looks more upmarket and is popular with gelato shops, though it can show water marks briefly when the cup is wet. Spot UV on a matte cup gives you both: a soft cup with a shiny logo. Foil is possible for a premium pint, but keep it to the logo rather than large areas that get handled with cold, wet fingers.

If you care about disposal, recyclable and biodegradable options are available, and the print can use soy- or vegetable-based inks.

Design ideas for scoop shops and frozen dessert brands

Print around the full wall. Customers turn a cup as they eat. A pattern that wraps the whole cup looks good from every angle, and the logo should repeat at least twice.
Keep the top band clear. The first half inch under the rim gets covered by the scoop, drips and the customer's thumb. Put your logo lower down.
Add a flavor checklist to pint cups. A printed list of flavors with tick boxes lets staff mark what's inside without a separate sticker. It helps in the freezer at home too.
Print the lid as well. Pints are stored lid-up in a freezer, so the lid is what people see when they open the door.
Use colors that look like your flavors. Pastel pinks, mint greens and creamy yellows feel like ice cream. Dark heavy colors can look out of place on a summer counter.
Match your cones. Shops that serve both often use the same pattern on cups and cone sleeves so the counter looks like one brand. The current ice cream cone sleeve trends are a useful source of pattern ideas that carry over to cups.

Planning an ice cream cup order

List your servings. Write down every size you sell in a cup, and how many of each you go through on a busy weekend.
Decide which sizes need lids. Usually that is takeout pints and anything sent out for delivery.
Prepare your artwork or send a logo and color ideas. Design help is free, and the step-by-step order form on this page lets you set size, finish and print area.
Test a free sample in your freezer. Fill it, freeze it overnight and check the lid fit, the stiffness and the print the next day.
Approve the proof. Turnaround is 4–6 business days after approval, with rush options if the weather turns early.
Order ahead of the season. Ice cream is seasonal, so most shops place their big run in spring. The minimum is 100 cups and volume discounts make larger seasonal orders cheaper per cup. Shipping is free to the USA, Canada, the UK and Australia.

Shops that keep running out mid-summer often split orders: a large run of their best-selling single cup in spring and a smaller top-up order of our standard ice cream paper cups in July.

Who orders printed ice cream cups

Ice cream parlors and gelato shops are the obvious buyers, but they're not the only ones. Frozen yogurt bars use wider cups for toppings. Dessert cafes and creperies add a scoop cup to the menu as a side. Ice cream trucks and carts use small open cups for kids who can't manage a cone. Schools, summer camps and church fairs order a short run with the event name for a single afternoon. Restaurants that make their own ice cream use printed pint cups as a take-home product at the register, which turns a dessert into a retail item.

If you serve cones too, custom waffle cone sleeves in the same design give customers a consistent look whichever way they order. Shaved ice and snow cone stands are a related case, and many of them use cone-shaped or small paper cups from the wider cup range.

Ice cream cup orders that go sideways

Cup depth versus spoon length

A deep cup with short tasting spoons means sticky fingers by the last bite. Check the spoons you already stock against the cup height, or order the cup shape around the spoon customers will use.

Serving scoops in coffee cups

Hot drink cups have a narrow mouth that smears the scoop against the rim and hides it from view. A proper ice cream cup is wider and shorter, so the scoop sits proud and looks generous.

Printing an allergen claim broadly

Putting nut-free or dairy-free on a cup that will hold every flavor creates a promise you cannot keep. Leave claims off the shared cup and mark special flavors with a separate label or a dedicated design.

Custom Ice Cream Cups: Frequently Asked Questions

What size paper cup holds a single scoop of ice cream?

It depends on your scoop size, so measure what your scoop actually holds before ordering. Shops usually choose a cup a little smaller than feels natural, because a scoop sitting above the rim looks generous. We make cups to custom sizes, so you can match the cup to the scoop you already portion and price.

Can ice cream cups go in a home freezer?

Yes. Lidded ice cream cups are made for freezer storage. The inside lining keeps moisture from soaking into the board, and the outside coating protects the print from frost and rubbing. For pints customers keep for a while, test a free sample in a freezer overnight to check the lid fit before your full order.

Do you make custom snow cone cups?

Shaved ice and snow cones are often served in cone-shaped cups or small paper cups rather than ice cream tubs. They need to hold syrup that runs to the bottom, so a lined stock matters. Take a look at our printed paper cone cups, which suit snow cone stands and summer events.

Can I print our flavors on the cup?

Yes. Two common ways are a full flavor list with tick boxes on pint cups, or a single flavor name per design for a signature line. The tick-box approach keeps one design for every flavor, which is simpler to stock. Separate flavor designs look better on a shelf but split your order into versions.

Are paper ice cream cups better than plastic tubs?

Paper cups print better, feel warmer in the hand and fit a brand that wants to cut plastic use. We offer recyclable and biodegradable options with soy- or vegetable-based inks. Plastic tubs are clearer and very rigid, but they are harder to print with detailed artwork. For a scoop shop, paper is the more common choice for both dine-in and pints.

What is the difference between an ice cream cup and a dessert cup?

An ice cream cup is built for cold and moisture, with a lining and coating that handle condensation and freezing. A dessert cup may hold pudding, mousse or fruit at fridge or room temperature. The shapes can look alike. If you serve both, our printed paper dessert cups cover the non-frozen side of the menu.

How many ice cream cups should I order for a summer season?

Look at last summer's busiest week and multiply by the weeks you trade, then add a margin for events. If you have no history, start smaller and reorder. The minimum is 100 cups, with volume discounts on larger runs, and turnaround is 4–6 business days after proof approval, so a mid-season top-up is realiztic.

Can I use ice cream cups for frozen yogurt with toppings?

Yes, and a wider, shallower cup works better for it. Toppings need space above the yogurt, and a wide mouth lets customers see them, which helps in self-serve shops. Print the logo low on the wall so it is not hidden behind the toppings. Most froyo bars order two or three sizes and charge by weight or by cup.

Do you make cone holders or stands for an ice cream counter?

Yes, alongside the cups. Shops that serve cones as well as cups often need a holder to stand cones upright while orders are prepared or carried to a table. Our printed ice cream cone holder can carry the same design as your cups so the counter looks consistent.

Can ice cream cups be printed for a single event?

Yes. School fun days, weddings, church fairs and corporate summer parties often order a small run of 100 or more with the event name and date. Free design help means you can send a few words and a logo and get a ready-to-print layout. Plan for the 4–6 business day turnaround after proof approval, or ask about rush options.